TL;DR: Ed Skyler, Citi head of enterprise services and public affairs and former deputy mayor in the Bloomberg administration joined ‘Squawk Box’ to discuss the results from New York City’s Democratic mayoral primary.
Towards the end of his appearance, Skyler claimed that 55% of NYC was planning on leaving within 5 years. He said this to bolster his argument that NYC residents are leaving due to high taxes (among other reasons).
The survey he references says the opposite of what he claimed, however, with 19% of people planning to leave NYC within the next 5 years.
I made a video if you want to watch instead.
As a New Yorker, I have been watching coverage of the election since the primary election.
Last night, I watched an interview on CNBC’s Squawk Box with a former deputy mayor under the Bloomberg administration.
Most of the interview went just as you might expect, but towards the end, the deputy mayor - Edward Skyler - who now works for Citibank as head of enterprise services and public affairs - drops some misinformation.
Check out the clip: Former NYC Deputy Mayor: You saw a huge enthusiasm gap between Mamdani and Cuomo supporters.
Mr. Skyler says that 55% of New Yorkers won’t be in New York in 5 years.
Usually, I don’t get too bothered about people getting things wrong, but this didn’t pass the smell test for me. A majority of New Yorkers were saying that they might leave the city within 5 years?
That didn’t sound right, so I decided to look into it.
No huge surprise – he’s totally wrong.
At first, I did a quick search on Google to help me find the exact statistic he’s referencing.
Google’s AI was really helpful in regurgitating the wrong information. The AI repeated some lies from the New York Post and NDTV, and even misrepresented what the makers of the survey - the Citizen’s Budget Commission - said.
The Google AI response, verbatim
The claim that “Fifty percent of New Yorkers say they plan to leave New York City over the next five years, according to a poll released Tuesday by the Citizens Budget Commission” appears to be based on the Citizens Budget Commission’s (CBC) “Straight from New Yorkers” survey
Where it says this:
- CBC Website: The CBC’s website and newsroom articles refer to the survey and state that 50.1% of New Yorkers planned to stay in the city over the next five years, down from 58.2% in 2017.
- News Articles: Several news outlets, including the New York Post and NDTV, reported on the survey findings and the 50% figure.
The survey question:
The wording of the specific survey question is not explicitly stated in the provided search results. However, based on the information provided, it’s highly probable the question was along the lines of asking residents about their intention to stay in New York City over the next five years. For example, the CBC states they asked residents if they “plan to stay in New York City in the next five years”.
Important Notes:
- The 50% figure specifically refers to the percentage of New Yorkers who stated they plan to stay in the city, which is a decline from 2017. This does imply a large number of residents are considering leaving, but the original statement phrasing might be slightly misleading.
- The survey data suggests dissatisfaction with various aspects of life in NYC as primary reasons for considering leaving, including affordability, safety, and living space.
- New Yorkers’ desire for action on safety, housing, infrastructure, and cleanliness are also highlighted as key findings from the survey.
Since Google referenced those organizations specifically, let’s take a look at the supporting data before we move onto the actual study.
The New York Post says: “When asked if they planned to stay in the Big Apple until 2028, only 50% of those surveyed said yes, down from 58% in 2017, according to the CBC.”
NDTV references the 50% figure in the headline, but never actually supports it in the article.
Okay, let’s take a look at the survey.
The survey is called “Straight from New Yorkers 2025” and is a survey of residents from across the 5 boroughs of 1,700 responses.
Let’s skip on down to the section we’re interested in.
Majority of New Yorkers say they will stay in NYC the next 5 years, but still lower than 2017
Remember that the former deputy mayor said that 55% of New Yorkers won’t be here in 5 years.
The survey says that 55% of New Yorkers will be staying over the next 5 years. If you look at the table, they also say that 19% of respondents say that they plan to leave within 5 years. This is an improvement from 2023, where respondents said that a quarter of them would be leaving within 5 years.
Clearly, they got it completely wrong. The deputy mayor was parroting misinformation from who knows where.
The anchor then asks a very reasonable question about who it was that was planning on leaving the city and why.
The only problem is, since the data wasn’t real to begin with, lacking the information, Mr. Skyler decided to guess in order to support his erroneous claim.
What’s the real reason?
The CBC has a handy graph for that too.
As you can see, the top three reasons are affordability, crime and safety and living space.
The survey itself says:
“These results reinforce the importance of New York City’s value proposition and ensuring the benefits of living here—cultural and social amenities, and economic opportunity—exceed the challenges of high costs, small apartments, and quality of life.”
Zohran Mamdani’s signature appeal in the primary election was a focus on affordability.
His campaign website says: “Zohran Mamdani is running for Mayor to lower the cost of living for working class New Yorkers.”
Unfortunately, over the next couple of months we’re going to see an uptick in the amount of misinformation being spread about this election - because we know that it works.
I hope that New Yorkers question the information they are receiving, because not everyone is interested in checking the information they are passing along. Sometimes, people are pushing a message that is based on half remembered statistics that say the opposite of what they thought.
Is CNBC going to issue a correction? I wouldn’t count on it.
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